Volunteers fan out to count Costa Mesa's homeless

COSTA MESA – His teacup poodle Fifi is so cute he says workers at the Costa Mesa BevMo want to make her the store mascot.

Jim Palmiter, a homeless man, has been living on the city's streets since June, when he left a bad relationship in Arizona. Despite his friends here, Palmiter, 55, may not meet one standard to receive homeless care: Is he from Costa Mesa?

A volunteer interviewed Palmiter on Monday as part of a survey of Costa Mesa's street people. As the city tries to manage its homeless population, some say it should focus on those who are from Costa Mesa. But no one has official data on their origins. A Vanguard University professor and a consortium of area churches Monday began interviewing and counting the city's homeless.

About 50 volunteers from area churches fanned out at 6:30 a.m. They divided the city into areas of one square mile and tried to count every homeless person they saw.

Vanguard sociology professor Ed Clarke trained volunteers using photos, helping them spot people with "symbols" of homelessness – backpacks, shopping carts, weathered faces and the like. Volunteers are conducting interviews at a soup kitchen, outside the city's main library and at a church.

"Sometimes they just need someone to listen to them," said volunteer Julie Dunbar, 31, from RockHarbor church.

Preliminary results indicate the homeless population may have grown, Clarke said. In recent years, the population has hovered between 80 and 120 people. But Monday, canvassers counted 53 people in one sector. That area, one of 14 counted, has a high concentration of homeless-service providers.

A checkup at the soup kitchen was the only medical care Palmiter has seen in recent years, he said, as he cradled his dog.

Those homeless services are magnets for outsiders, argues Mayor Eric Bever, who has drawn criticism for his recent calls to investigate two of the city's nonprofits. He calls them "attractive nuisances."

To judge where homeless people come from, the Vanguard interviewers ask where people "spend most of their time," if they have any family in the area, if they went to area schools, and where they were last housed.

This information could "give us a very good real-time understanding of the situation on the ground in Costa Mesa," Bever said in an email Monday.

Clarke says he wants to find out if the "social fear" of homeless people "invading" Costa Mesa is real or anecdotal. Mothers have complained they no longer feel safe bringing their kids to Lions Park or the city's main library – spots where homeless people gather.

Volunteers will also visit some of the city's motels and recovery homes to identify the "invisible homeless" – those who are close to being released onto the streets. Organizers plan to present their findings in January.